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New Computer Build

William Nieman
First of all, I am very happy with the new C1 v6 that I upgraded to the 5 user license. The work flow is so nice as my storage is done via our RAID 5, HP Server. All settings are saved automatically.....Thank you Phase One!!!


It is time for us to build another workstation and la\eave my old 32 bit workstations aside. The last 2 units we built were on an MSI X58 Pro Mother Board, i7 950 @3.07Ghz, 12 GB DDR3 Ram, C:130GB Velocity Raptor, D:1TB RAID1 with two WD RE3 drives, ATI HD4850 1GB PCI Express Display board, and Win 7 Home Premium.

I photograph about 4 Clients a day 300 images each, with a Canon 1D MKIII 12.5 mp camera.

What is this new Sandy Bridge all about?

I need a little advise this time around as the software has changed so much in the last 5 years, that I do not know much abut the architecture anymore.


Thanks to all, with great appreciation!
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Comments

17 comments

Date Votes
  • Paul Steunebrink
    Great to hear you are so happy about CO6. Any specific questions you like to ask (or didn't I read properly between the lines)?
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  • William Nieman
    The units I have process batches super fast. When I open a session from the D: Raid1 it takes a while. Also am I using the right type of graphics card?
    I do not understand Open-cl and it's effects nor Hyper-threading.
    If you can see any problems with the components in these machines please comment so I don't make the same mistake in the next build.
    I run Win 7 under Administrator.
    Most of the time I move my Sessions to and from my Server to the D: Raid 1 on the work stations to perform Capture One operations. The employees sometimes prefer to just open the sessions on the server from the workstations.

    nice to hear from you again!

    Bill
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  • Jim MSP
    If I did it again, I would have a solid state drive for my C drive.
    I also keep only programs on the C, no data.
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  • William Nieman
    Good point Jim,
    I see that the solid state drives are up to 240GB now days. As long as they are stable and done hang up the system, I can see where there would be a definite increase in speed.
    We could run one as C> and a second one for data as D>
    As for Capture One, I am under the impression that the program requires more RAM than Video RAM. Is this correct?
    My video card has 1GB RAM on it.

    Any one else running a Solid State Drive out there? I'd like your input.

    I just heard that the new Sandy Bridge LGA-1155 may not be as fast as the Bloomfield LGA-1366 i7 core processors.
    Any feed back?


    Bill
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  • William Nieman
    Paul,

    If you were going to build from scratch, what components would you order?

    Bill
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  • Jim MSP
    [quote="William1111" wrote:
    Good point Jim,
    I see that the solid state drives are up to 240GB now days. As long as they are stable and done hang up the system, I can see where there would be a definite increase in speed.
    We could run one as C> and a second one for data as D>
    As for Capture One, I am under the impression that the program requires more RAM than Video RAM. Is this correct?
    My video card has 1GB RAM on it.
    ....

    Bill

    I don't know whether you would gain significant speed with a SS for data, I just want the Windows, CO, PS, and the scratch drive to be on the SS.

    Re CO Ram requirements -- all I know is I am still having some memory issues on my system (as are others - see their posts). When the memory of CO 6.2.1 starts to exceed 1.3G - 1.5G, I will sometimes encounter a lockup/crash. I generally monitor memory usage, quitting and restarting CO when I reach 1.3G.
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  • William Nieman
    I have been having issues with it hanging up especially when opening sessions. I'll watch for memory usage in Task Manager next time.
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  • Paul725
    [quote="William1111" wrote:
    Paul,

    If you were going to build from scratch, what components would you order?

    Bill


    Sandy Bridge is the new Intel processor / mother board architecture (Jan 2011)
    The 2600K is the top of the line performance is comparable to the old gulf town 6 core but a third of the price
    I built a new PC in February a 2600k processor , 8 GB ram and a NVidia 570 graphics with Win 7 64 bit professional
    I would suggest you get the 2600k overclocked, mine can run at 4.6ghz, this processor has the hyperthreading.
    Hyperthreading users the spare capacity of a core to simulate another core, according to the PC mags it now works
    With CO 6.2. 1 it will process 10 EOS 7D raw files to jpeg in 32 seconds,
    The specialist PC flight simulator magazine got a computer company to build a PC especially for flight simulation and these were the basically the specs they use.
    PS don’t skimp on the power supply
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  • William Nieman
    Thanks Paul 27,

    This is exactly what I was looking for in this thread. I'll start pricing the components and start making plans.
    I see that Crucial Tech has a nice 256GB SSD I might want to pick up for my C: drive. I hope that these new drives are functioning properly now. There were issuse with SSD earlier this year.

    Thanks again for the info.

    Bill
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  • jonpaul
    Hello all: I am a retired EE who has been working with PCs since 1985 and writing code in the 1960s, an Internet Dinosaur.

    1/ I built a W7/AMD/Gigabyte MoBo sys a year ago: I am running W7 Pro and C1 64 bit with no problems. I am editing 39M images from a P45+ and I look forward to working with the 80M images of an IQ180.

    2/ SSD are very costly per GB and you don't need more than 60..100G!

    You MUST use C: JUST TO BOOT, and NOT use the default of every program to load at C\program files\! So I install ALL progr to D:, an HDD partition.

    On my C: is JUST W7 system, I had to carefully tweak Windows and other programs to minimize use of C: eg for temp and scratch.

    Read up on the selection, care and feeding of SSD, they ARE different animals from HDD! 🤓

    3. My drive lineup is: C: W7 and docs and settings 64M SSD
    D; Programs and install downloads only
    E: Data, files, images, email
    F: Backup, large files, media like music.

    All 3 are partitions on a 1.5T Seagate HDD
    G:, H: I: another 1.5T Seagate HDD for backup and spare capacity

    4/ Sandybridge is just one of many many evolutions in Intel CPU architecture. But I cannot recommend Intel CPUs as they are MUCH morer costly than AMD and no real difference in performance or reliability. I used an AMD Phenom II hex core CPU.

    5/ 1G Video RAM is fine for my 30" Dell which runs 2560 x 1900 resolution. The more RAM the better, but it need not be super fast: I have 16GB DDR3 which maxes out the MoBo

    6/ I used a huge Silverstone case and PC Power and Cooling high rel PSU. I designed it for easy access and low noise, many large and slow fans and a passive cooled Gigibyte 1G video card. Be VERY careful on MoBo selection as you MUST get your 1394 and USB ports right eg USB3 for IQ series backs.
    Total cost about $1500. 😉

    If the originator of this this thread wants to pass his email to me I am happy to send him the parts list and a few photos.

    Kind Regards,
    Jon Paul
    Crypto Museum
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  • William Nieman
    Thank you for your kind responses!
    Very interesting and helpful comments, by the way.
    How many processor cores is Capture One 6.2 capable of using?

    On to Video Cards
    I have an ATi 4850, 1Gig, it uses 800 Stream Processing Units.
    I only use one monitor on this machine EIZO CG243W 1900 x 1200.
    Are there other factors other than Video RAM and Stream Processors that I need to look into?

    I value your knowledge.
    Thanks Again!
    niemphot@wctc.net

    Bill
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  • jonpaul
    Hello William! Thanks for the kind comment.

    1, CPU/Cores: Hex core is enough and C1 (as well as CS5, Lightroom, etc) all can make use of as many cores as you have. The cost of CPU had dropped so much that you should get hex (or more!). BUT ignore the speed, CPU (and RAM) speed is NOT a big factor in this kind of work. I suggest AMD not Intel for the most bang for the buck!

    2, Video: We are not gaming or video editing. High frame rates and bandwidth are NOT an issue! Still photography is fine with any reasonable card's Stream Processors.

    What DOES matter:
    Resolution 2560 x 1900 = 30" Apple Cinema display, Dell U3011 30" etc.
    Dual monitor capability if you may use that in the future
    NO FAN: Passive cooling for a quiet PC, as you will spend many hours close to it and the small GPU fans are fast and loud.
    DVI-D connectors and HDMI! (if you dont know about DVI-D, research the wiki and check the big monitor specs)

    My Gigabyte Radeon HD 4300/4500 with 1G video is passive and cooled by a slow and quiet 4" case fan that blows over its massive heat sink.

    3. MoBo: Be sure it has enough PATA and SATA HDD connectors to accommodate lots of storage and expansion.
    Be sure it has enough RAM slots, at least 4!
    Check if it has USB3 and what speed 1394 (FireWire) ports. If you plan to ever get an IQ back, you will want USB 3.0 and FW 800. My Gigabyte DID have a few USB 3.0 but only FW 400.
    NO need to run more than one video card and the onboard sound and video are not important.
    Be sure it will fit in your preferred case!

    I will email you and we can discuss more off the forum via email or skype.

    Kind Regards,

    Jon Paul
    Crypto-Museum
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  • William Nieman
    Thank you JonPaul & Jim MSP,

    This tread is worthy of printing a hard copy.
    Great knowledge from great experience.
    You have given a foundation to build on.

    Thanks again,

    Bill
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  • Pjotr
    Good posts. To add to this

    1/ As a professional monitor user you will calibrate your monitor regularly of coarse 😄 I noticed that some USB ports do not supply enough power for the calibrator head (Gretag-Macbeth I1 in my case) and others do. Something to watch out for.

    2/ With regard to DVI, high resolution monitors require two cables (dual ink). To circumvent this, DisplayPort is coming up nowadays and more and more pro monitors are supporting it. Your video card must have DisplayPort connectors of coarse then. DisplayPort supports up to 16bit/colour but I do not know of photo software making use of it.
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  • jonpaul
    Hello William! Thanks for the kind comment.

    1, CPU/Cores: Hex core is enough and C1 (as well as CS5, Lightroom, etc) all can make use of as many cores as you have. The cost of CPU had dropped so much that you should get hex (or more!). BUT ignore the speed, CPU (and RAM) speed is NOT a big factor in this kind of work. I suggest AMD not Intel for the most bang for the buck!

    2, Video: We are not gaming or video editing. High frame rates and bandwidth are NOT an issue! Still photography is fine with any reasonable card's Stream Processors.

    What DOES matter:
    Resolution 2560 x 1900 = 30" Apple Cinema display, Dell U3011 30" etc.
    Dual monitor capability if you may use that in the future
    NO FAN: Passive cooling for a quiet PC, as you will spend many hours close to it and the small GPU fans are fast and loud.
    DVI-D connectors and HDMI! (if you dont know about DVI-D, research the wiki and check the big monitor specs)

    My Gigabyte Radeon HD 4300/4500 with 1G video is passive and cooled by a slow and quiet 4" case fan that blows over its massive heat sink.

    3. MoBo: Be sure it has enough PATA and SATA HDD connectors to accommodate lots of storage and expansion.
    Be sure it has enough RAM slots, at least 4!
    Check if it has USB3 and what speed 1394 (FireWire) ports. If you plan to ever get an IQ back, you will want USB 3.0 and FW 800. My Gigabyte DID have a few USB 3.0 but only FW 400.
    NO need to run more than one video card and the onboard sound and video are not important.
    Be sure it will fit in your preferred case!

    I will email you and we can discuss more off the forum via email or skype.

    Kind Regards,

    Jon Paul
    Crypto-Museum
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  • jonpaul
    Hello all: Dual link DVI is NOT two cables, Instead it is special single cable whose connector is fully populated.

    Please see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Vi ... #Connector

    Kind Regards,

    Jon Paul
    Crypto-Museum
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  • Pjotr
    Anyway DisplayPort becomes available more and more with graphic monitors.

    B.t.w. a fan on a video card isn't necessarily noisy. My PNY NVIDIA Quadro FX 580 entry level pro card has a small fan on it which is inaudible with regular work and photo work. Only with heavy 3D solid real time rendering the fan speeds up, but even then noise from the fan is barely audible.
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